You Look At Me and It's Like You Hit Me With Lightning

So, I haven't posted in something like 2 years.

A few things have happened. Quick recap:

Rebecca moved in, we dated for a year, then I decided to end things. She moved out a little while later. We're still friends.

I (finally) graduated in May '11 with a double major in Math and CS. That was super, super, super exciting. There was a long time where I didn't think I would ever accomplish that. It really scared me to think that I would be spending the rest of my life working at places like Sonic and Domino's, that that's all I would ever amount to. I don't mean to impugn the people that do work there; I only mean to say that it's not where I should be. After graduation, i began applying at places in Austin, and got great responses - I was interviewing with several different place, got a job offer from a place called Starmount, and accepted immediately. I mean, I suppose it might have been prudent to wait and compare the offers, see which one was best, and which company would be the best fit / opportunity for me, but I was so desperate to get out of Domino's, I wasn't going to wait another day if I didn't have to.

It was actually an interesting (well, kinda) story how it happened. I did a phone interview on Wednesday or Thursday, and he said he'd call me back within a week to let me know if they wanted to bring me onsite for another interview. He then called me back 10 minutes later (!) to ask me about coming in for an interview. The soonest they could do it was Wednesday, so that's when I went in. It went pretty well, and again, he said he'd call me back within a week with their decision. I couldn't think about much else the next two days (other than the other jobs I was also applying for), but Friday evening at 5pm rolls around, and I'm very sad, because I thought there was no way I was going to hear from them over the weekend, which meant I had to wait until Monday to hear anything, either way. However, my phone rang around 530, and it was Starmount, calling me to offer a job! I was totally freaked, and accepted immediately. There were some formalities involved, but that Sunday was my last day (ever) at Domino's. That was 8 months ago, and I've been pretty awesome ever since.

I moved out of the house (finally) and got a town house on the upper east side. Well, I'm leasing one in a complex that's literally at 183 and 35. Ended up with Ambra as a roommate again, not sure how I feel about that. Sometimes, it's cool; other times, she can be a little annoying. I mean, I'm sure she'd say roughly the same thing about me, so at least it's balanced.

So, life for the most part is pretty awesome. I've been working out a little and lost some weight, now I just need to lose like 200 more pounds. I have a few goals, and I'm definitely going skydiving as soon as I'm able.

Oh, and there's a girl - Katie. Met her at work (what else is new?), and we've been hanging out a lot lately. Like, she came over Saturday at 9 pm, stayed all the way 'til Sunday at 8 pm, and then sent me a text that says "So yeah that was cool. We're totally weird but I think it's pretty awesome."

I'm finishing this up right now, but don't worry, there'll be plenty of over-analyzing, stupid obsessing, and overthinking things in the posts to come.

Also, I can't believe this is still online.

Ellie Goulding -- Starry Eyed

Take the glitz back, I want the soul instead

Five months.

It's been about five months since I've posted. I'll try to catch up with what I've missed.

School:

School's going really well so far. Took those three classes during the Spring semester, got a 4.0. That was pretty neat. The day of Finals was kind of funny. They schedule like 2 hours for each final, and mine were back to back to back. Each final took me around thirty to forty-five minutes to do, giving me between forty-five minutes and an hour to kill between each final, in addition to the half hour break they already build in to the schedule. The obvious answer would be to use that time to review the material and/or study for the next final; the only problem with that, of course, is that I don't like to count on such intangible, unsure variables like that, so I was completely ready for each final. I went to a dining hall and grabbed some breakfast during one break, and I don't recall what I did during the other final. After the last one, I had to walk to work where Mom was picking me up to give me a ride home.

Something had gone crazy wrong with my truck. Ended up dropping quite a bit on new tires, then I had to have the engine remounted and stuff (they did it wrong during the original installation). That was fun. I ended up only taking three hours during summer school, one class during Summer I. Phil 1305, Introduction to Philosophy and Critical Thinking. The class was okay, I guess. Every morning at 8 am, for two hours, Monday through Friday. I ended up late to work quite a few days because of it, which was fun. I pulled a strong A in that class as well, which was really good, 'cause it was a Writing Intensive class, and I hate writing. It seemed like the more outlandish I made my conclusion, the better my grade on the test was. I don't know if it just did a better job of making my point, or my writing just got stronger as the semester went on, or the professor just appreciated someone who could effectively communicate the material and their understanding thereof, while still making their conclusion fun to read. I hope it was the latter, but I'm not counting on it. Whatever.

So I didn't take any classes during Summer II, 'cause of the money I had to drop on my truck. I'm registered for 13 hours, 4 classes and 1 lab, for the Fall. Chem II, Chem II Lab, Prob & Stat, Data Structures, and Intro to Fine Arts. I even got some financial aid for this and the Spring semesters. It's pretty awesome. Class starts in about two weeks. I've got most of my textbooks, bought two textbooks online - ebay and amazon are pretty neat, around half price of what the bookstore wanted, *and* I could flip them back for most of the price. I still have to pick up my Chem book/lab manual at the bookstore; the professor wrote both of them. So that's fun. Got my classes blocked Monday/Wednesday, which works out well. I start at 9:30 both mornings; Monday, I go to 6-something, on Wednesday, I'm out around 3-something. Long days, but I'll be taking both days off work so I don't have to go in that night. I might take the occasional Tuesday night off as well, to give me some time to get some real sleep. Of course, that's all depending on the work situation, which will have to get better before I'm able to do so, but we'll get to that later.

And I'm officially a senior.

So I don't feel like going into work just yet, so I guess I'll go with personal stuff next. I finally started a good diet that I'm comfortable with, and I feel confident that I can stick with it, for the most part. Coupling that with the amounts of exercise I have lined up, I hope, I really hope, that I can finally lose some weight.

Socially, it's just as much of an abyss as always. Didn't talk to anyone in any of my classes over the fall semester, or the one I had in the summer. I ended up sitting behind this semi-cute girl over the summer, didn't really get her name or anything. She was a hippie (Wait. Her parents were hippies. I'm not sure?) from Austin. Anyway.

So still friends with Matt, we work out and/or play racquetball in the mornings when our schedules work out. Haven't talked to Cullen recently, though I hope to remedy that soon. Rose is moving out of her parents place, which is cool, getting a little one bedroom; I'm helping her move (no big surprise there). Haven't made any new friends (except at work, but that gets covered in the work section) lately. Maybe that'll change in the Fall. I doubt it, but whatever.

Work's been interesting. Our new GM is working out really well, he's a really cool guy. We're getting pasta and sandwiches in the next few weeks (Sh! Nobody's allowed to know that!), which means we have to regear a lot of things, and find room for a bunch of new products, and retrain everyone on new stuff. It's going to be somewhat more labor-intensive, which kind of sucks. The only good part is that we're getting some good stuff, like sliced provolone, genoa salami, and chicken. Of course, they don't really fit in with my diet, so I'll only taste them sparingly, but it'll probably positively impact sales.

Bill no longer works there; he left to go to Colorado or something, leaving me as the only MiT right now. Jen Fee almost came back, but she went to Kyle instead. I've mentioned to Ambra that she should come back and be an MiT for us; new gm, new dm, there's a good chance they'll let her. They should - she's well trained, she's smart, they let her GM a store for over six months. Oh, and we're NOT DATING, nor WERE WE EVER. They're cracking down ever harder on employee dating, transferred a GM to a completely different district because she was dating another GM. Whatever. We did hire this awesome insider named Becky, but she only worked here for the summer. That made me sad, especially when she left like two weeks ago. Thanks to that, we're still working on improving our inside staff. We need another shift runner or MiT, probably another insider or two. We did hire Janelle as a driver, that's pretty neat. She might be moving back here for her last semester and/or year of school, which would be interesting. Her and Mom don't get along as well as her and I do, so she's a little worried that it might not work out, that they're going to clash too hard much for her to live here. I keep telling her that it was hard for me at first, but that it got a lot better, especially once school started.

Anyway.

So that's what's going on with that.

Vanessa Carlton -- Nolita Fairytale

Don't you have somewhere to go?

So I know it's clichè, but what with time being an arbitrary concept and all, New Year's provides just as good a time to reflect as anything. A good time to look back at the last year, see where I am, where I'm going, what's coming up.

Let's start with what happened recently. I worked New Year's Eve, which isn't a big deal. I usually do - last year, the year before that, the year before that, but the year before that, I think I was with Suzie in Galveston. I remember three New Year's ago, when I got off from Sonic, was driving home, Mom called me from All Niter, her and Jerry were there, we sat on the patio and had breakfast. Lilie drove by. Good times. So anyway.

I spent this New Year's making pizzas. Luckily, I wasn't taking an order or anything when the ball dropped (which is my way of saying "Midnight struck"). Just kind of standing there. I was very aware of when it was. Bill and Chris were my closing drivers, but they were both out on runs. They were pretty much running nonstop 'til the end of the night. I got a few calls around midnight - Danielle called, that was awesome. Hadn't really talked to her or anything in quite a while. Danielle and Jenni both called, that was fun. Had a few drunks order some pizza in person, that's always fun. I think part of my aversion to drinking is how very, very much I hate talking to drunk people. I hear it's not so bad when you're also drunk. Whatever.

I went to Wal-Mart after work, picked up some juice and stuff. Of course, Rebecca was my cashier. Good times. She was smiling a lot. I'm not naive enough to think she was smiling because of me, but it was definitely at, and I'll take my victories where I can get them.

[Sidenote: I'm watching "Blonde Ambition" while typing this. Atrocious movie. Jessica Simpson's character is a country bumpkin stuck in the big city. She doesn't know how to ride a bike. I'll let that sink in a for a moment. At least Rachael Leigh Cook is in it. She's awesome. Also, apparently, she did the voice of Tifa Lockhart in most of the Final Fantasy adaptations, post-VII. Good stuff.]

Anyway, it really helped dispel all the bad vibes I got from her on Christmas Eve with Jenni. Moving on. I had to give Rose a ride home the next night, she needed to go to Wal-Mart that night. We spent about fifteen minutes in the hair care aisle, she needed some conditioner without certain chemicals in it. Or something, I don't know. I keep my head shaved. Whatever. We had to go through sporting goods for a thermos or something. For whatever reason, I picked up a baseball bat. I started carrying that around for a while. It's a guy thing. Whatever.

So we took the corner towards electronics, and she's standing there right next to the Guitar Hero demo. Long story short, she's watching electronics during lunch, and the other girl, the one playing very badly in training mode, was on lunch. I felt kind of weird holding on to the bat, but I went with it. Rose kind of took off, went to finish her shopping. The girl playing finished the song, realized the game probably wasn't for her. Rebecca and I talked a little while the other girl (she needs a name if I'm going to bring her up very many more times in this story; 'other girl' and 'that girl' is starting to get a little repetitive). She said something about her brother who 'has like, every video game system ever' and apparently doesn't like girls that much because they talk to much and prevent him from playing his games. Good times. She thinks he might be gay. Or something. She didn't want to play, because her eyes don't focus fast enough. She said something about the doctor telling her she needs to exercise her eyes more, and she's annoyed, because the last thing she wants is another doctor telling her she needs to exercise more. Or something.

[How the F did they get Rachael Leigh Cook for this piece of crap? It's awesomely tragic. Oh, crap, Willie Nelson. He must really like Jessica Simpson, or something.]

So she - that other girl - finishes, and asks Rebecca if she wants to play, so she turns to me and asks me if I want to. I hesitantly accepted. I went with 'Hit Me With Your Best Shot', because I know the song really well. I did 98%-ish. It was great, because my hands were sweaty. I'm a big, big guy, and I like to think I do some physically demanding things - I play racquetball, I play DDR. I sweat a lot during those times, but my hands stay dry. They don't sweat at all. Ever.

But they were sweating the whole time I played the song. I guess that means I was really, really nervous. Which I was. Which means I actually like her.

Crazy.

Moving on.

So I finished the song, put down the guitar, said something to the effect of "That's not really fair, 'cause I play this all the time.", picked up the baseball bat I set down by the demo unit, and walked off. I had no idea what was going on. I found Rose, and we went about our shopping. She asked me where the latex gloves were, so I went and asked Rebecca. We talked a bit.

Oh, I was still holding the baseball bat. It wouldn't be right without it.

We talked a little bit; she told me a story about her boyfriend. I'm still debating the point of the story. It could go any number of ways - maybe she was just making small talk (it was a funny story, after all), or just sharing about her New Year's Eve / life stuff, or, quite possibly,

[Major plot hole. This is what I don't get. If they want Jessica Simpson's character to be that idiot's secretary so they can manipulate her, why are they constantly sabotaging her plans? Wouldn't they want to help her and have her do well, so she would gain his trust and thus be a more valuable asset in their plan? I guess that's what I get for trying to actually follow the plot of a movie that makes fun of Norwegians for no real reason. It's not so much making fun of them, as it is randomly having them do karaoke - 'Baby Got Back', no less - in the most horrendous accents I've ever heard.]

[Oh gosh. Here comes the montage where the small-town girl grows accustomed to her big-city job, but turns her back on her small-town roots. I'm already looking forward to the moment of truth where she decides, momentously, to re-embrace her values.]

or, quite possibly, as a way to remind me that she has a boyfriend. (Of course, best-case is that she was reminding herself, because she was afraid she was forgetting. Probably not, but it's fun to dream.)

Moving on.

We got the gloves, we went home.

So yeah, that was fun.

Now, about reminiscing and stuff.

Let's start with work.

I started the New Year working at Wal-Mart. Literally - as usual, I was working that night. Worked there until early April, when Javi called me and asked me if I wanted to come back to Sonic. Ashley Hopkins lent a lot of credence to that argument, and I walked out. That was fun. What was really, really fun about that was that Ambra had started working there by that point, she was also working that night. Lots of freight, understaffed, all the greatest hits we know and love from working at Wal-Mart.

I started at Sonic a week later. It was, well, interesting. Ashley ended up quitting, so did Javi. I ended up working around seventy hours a week. I didn't mind the hours - one week, I had about ninety hours, that was a nice paycheck. Overall, it was a good turning point - allowed me to build a decent reserve really fast (I moved back home around the same time, worked out well). The problem I had at Sonic? Well, it was two-fold. First, as it often the case with crappy service jobs, everyone there hated working it. Now, the thing about these jobs is that the co-workers often make it bearable. That wasn't the case - they had really, really bad attitudes. I can name a few off the top of my head, but it's really not worth it. The second issue was Bubba. He was cool at first, until I got to know him. Not hiring people, not taking an active hand in his store, underordering, argh. I got sick of it.

Luckily, Sergio called from Domino's and asked me if I wanted to come be an assistant for him, as he had just gotten the store. I thought about it, but I was afraid. I hate big decisions; I seem to always mess them up. Of course, I felt pretty good about that one. I put in my two weeks at Sonic, walked out a week later. I've been working at Domino's ever since. Of course, my work history now goes Sonic - Domino's - Wal-Mart - Sonic - Domino's. Good stuff. There was a two day stint at CRI, which isn't really even worth mentioning (well, except for that).

So, yeah. Been working 40-50 (more like 45, not so much 50 anymore) hours a week there, 5-C five times a week.

There's work.

Living Situation.

Not much to talk about here. I was living at Les Chateaux, but I moved home. It does make me feel kind of a loser and all, being twenty-five, working at Domino's, being completely single, morbidly obese, good times. Of course, I'm working on all of those things. I'm twenty-five and don't have a degree, but I am back in school. I'm funding that with Domino's, and I'm working on my weight. Good stuff. Oh, and I pay rent.

[Holy crap, this movie sucks.]

Social:

HAHAHAHAHAHA. Not much to say here. Thankfully, Lilie is no longer a part of my life in any way. Passed her on Thanksgiving, didn't answer when she called. I still think about her occasionally, during depression spirals,

[This scene is actually humorous.]

but that's not really specific to her - that's more about her being the last person I was that close to, and her being such a major part of my life for so long. Comparatively speaking, of course.

So yeah, single and probably going to stay that way for a while. No real prospects or anything. I mean, I kind of have a thing for Rebecca,

[Extreme Sports Bonanza? I miss Rachael Leigh Cook pretending to be part of the marina group.]

Moving on.

but I'm not going to delude myself into thinking that anything's going to happen there.

[Now the running to find his true love and prevent a misunderstanding from becoming a tragedy. Gyp and Buddy could have written a more imaginative, if more cheese-oriented, screenplay.]

So what's in store for this year? School. Work. Getting in shape. Taking control of my life, maybe growing up a little (not too much, don't worry).

So, resolutions? Not sure. I'm cutting dairy almost entirely out of my diet, but that's not a resolution so much as it is a 'I don't want to feel like crap, I'm lactose intolerant' kind of thing. I'm going to be back in school, but that's too much of a thing that's like, interwoven into your life to be a New Year's Resolution. The same goes for health things. I'll get back to you on that one.

Ashlee Simpson -- Boyfriend

A million miles away, but always in my heart

So jury duty wasn't too bad today. We got out of there around 4-ish, having finished the entire docket, so we don't have to go back tomorrow. Just one more session, January 9th-ish. It's pretty cool, 'cause I still have all of tomorrow off to do with as I please. Might go to Domino's and work on the map book, might lounge around the house, might clean up my room.

Let's see, what else?

Oh, right.

Had an(other) sex dream about Ambra. Was a pretty sweet set-up. We were both lying on her living room floor, like when we were hanging out watching Heroes. I kiss her on the cheek like I'm kissing her goodbye, she kisses me back on the cheek, then I kiss her again. Then we start making out. She says something along the lines of 'finally', and clothes start coming off.

Good times.

Jesse -- My Star

Sometimes, the feeling is right

So Ambra got fired from her job about a week ago. Came home in tears Friday afternoon, was really frustrated, and understandably so. I'm not really certain on the specifics, but the main that stood out is she felt she had been very wrongfully terminated. Nothing like discrimination, just that the reason they gave her was bullshit.

I don't know.

But she needed a new job pretty much right away, being in a similar financial situation as myself. I found out Saturday she was leaving Sunday to go home for a week, to work for her dad at his shop; she had worked there a lot when she was younger and lived at home. She called yesterday (?) or the day before and told me she was staying another week or so, I think she's coming back a week from tomorrow.

Scrap all that. I just got her voice mail, and I was kind of tired when I listened to it, but I think it said she's coming in tomorrow. I guess I misunderstood her second phone call, which I originally thought was her saying that she was going to be coming in the Friday after this Sunday, but maybe she was saying this Friday? I don't know. I just have trouble believing I misunderstood her that completely. Well, I guess that absolves me of the need to make a post about how I feel about her being gone for another week.

Aqua -- Dr. Jones

I'd never let him touch my heart

That last post was both too long, and not as informative as I had hoped. Suffice to say, the last two weeks had some pretty low points.

Anyway.

One other thing I wanted to talk about from work - Matt. Him and I have been getting along *great*, despite the disparity in our ages - he's actually like 31 or something. He's been there maybe three years, and I totally forgot that he worked there when I applied there. But yeah, we've been getting along really well, hanging out at lunch, giving him a ride to and from work at times, that kind of stuff. We've also been playing racquetball a lot - he's been totally kicking my ass, but not nearly as much as the scores suggest. I just have issues returning his serves. If I manage that, and we get to a volley, I more than hold my own. It's just that, well, he'll get like fix to seven aces IN A ROW, which makes things very disheartening. Briefly.

But the thing I wanted to touch on is one other way we're very similar - Mat is also in love with a girl who doesn't love him back. Not like he wants her to, at least. However, the key difference with him is that he's decided there isn't anyone else out there for him, that she's the only person he'll ever love, ever. He lives with her, but they're just friends, and I mean actually just friends. Nothing like the 'just friends' Lilie and I have at times, or anything even close. I mean, even if we didn't fool around like we do, we'd still be close - holding hands and the like. And while I may still be hopelessly in love with her, I'm not so far gone as to believe that she's the only person out there that I could ever love, that it's her or nothing, ever. I mean, that sort of unwavering, unquestionable love may make for great stories, but it's too heart-wrenching of a way to approach life. I guess I could see it if we had been together for a long time or something, but we weren't, and it doesn't really apply here. It's kind of an eye-opener, to see how he's completely attached his life to hers. That's not something I want to go through.

Then, of course, the question comes up, would moving in with them be a step in that direction? Maybe, but I don't think so. I mean, I've contemplated dating other girls, I'm not so far gone as to believe she's the only one for me, ever, that it's her or nothing for the rest of my life. I mean, if she ever wanted to get back together, I'd be all for it, though I know that there are core differences that stop us from being a great couple, and that they'd have to change or be reconciled before "us" would happen, and I don't see that happening any time soon. Which is fine - I don't believe in changing the core of who you are for someone else. But yeah, we've even talked about it. Kinda. We talked more about physical aspects than dating - she's finally not shy about telling me when she's crushing on someone else, because maybe I've finally got her to realize that I'm okay with it? I hope so. I'm finally able to talk to her about my experience with others, as well - nothing major, just things like I've been really noticing - staring at, really - my roommate's massive rack lately. Her possessiveness/insecurity was kind of cute, while somewhat revealing - "You just don't love my boobs anymore", that kind of thing.

So yeah, seeing Matt go through the sheer hell that he does with Celeste is a real eye-opener, makes me see what I could have been, if I had taken the Lilie thing too far, and I think a lot of people, when they council me to move on past her, fear that I'm doing what he is, while I'm not.

Deep Dish vs Dire Straits -- Flashing for Money

I don't belong to you

Another week of work survived, another weekend.

Good times.

Thanksgiving was pretty good, had it at Mom's house. Ambra joined us, since she was unable to make it home to be with her family. It was pretty good, but the turkey had been sitting a while, so it wasn't very warm, and I felt it was kind of tough. Everything else was awesome. I've been wanting to really learn how to cook ever since I started not having to make food for other people; I had hoped to spend most of Thanksgiving at Mom's, helping her make food and learning from her, but I had to sleep from work. Ugh. Ah, well, I can still experiment with crazy vegetable medleys for now.

Work's been going okay, I guess. They served us pizza Thanksgiving morning (originally slated was chicken and mashed potatoes), then sub sandwiches the next night, 'cause our day-after sale ("Blitz") went really well. They had me on 01 last night, which is aisles 13 and 14, which is basically soda and water. Well, at least that's the part we're concerned with. I had to use this weird device, it's like a forklift, but you stand behind it to operate it. I screwed up and pierced a diet Dr. Thunder can, spilled it over the entire stack, but other than that, it went alright. Nolan was kind of annoying me, acting like he has final say on what days I have off, if Paul and I can switch days - after Manual, the manager who's actually *in charge* of these things, approved it - that kind of thing. That, and he keeps calling me 'Bill' occasionally. I won't respond to that, and I've told him that a few times. I've also heard Matt say that he's (one of) the reason(s) I'm still in grocery, and not being allowed to transfer to electronics, as though he has any real say in it.

Fun story: The 'official' reason that I'm not being moved to electronics is that I'm not job-coded for it. Except I wouldn't be, since I'M NOT THERE YET. Also, I'm not job-coded for my current position either, which kind of contradicts that logic. Whatever.

So I've almost covered that list, save one topic - Lilie's breasts. Um, they're nice. Yeah.

Speaking of Lilie... one final post coming up. Well, not one final post, but one new one.

Lasgo -- Don't Belong 2 U

Almost made you love me

So Ambra and are having a discussion concerning the fact that her friend from work is going to be coming by all weekend to take care of her cat.

Notable quote:

Ambra, to her friend, referring to me: "I told her that if you're not asleep, you're probably awake."

Excellent deduction.

Brandy -- Almost Doesn't Count

Thought you would treat me right

So, been a while since my last post. It will come to no surprise that I didn't do the followup post on Lilie that I had referenced, but it really wouldn't have been worth reading anyway. Or rather, to contrast it with everything else on here, it wouldn't have been interesting at all. Wait, that's not contrast. Damn.

Anyway.

So yeah, I'm basically moved into the new place. It's pretty cool so far. Got the couch set up, got the TV hooked up with cable and the PS2. It's nice having composite input, instead of having to depend on RF adapaters. I even picked up an input box, so I won't have to depend on them anymore. I can hook up the N64 as well, whenever I have an urge to play Blast Corps or Ogre Battle 64. I still plan on hooking up my old box and having a media server, but I have to buy a hard drive to do that, and probably the center of a stereo system, so I'll be waiting a bit on that.

So yeah, the move. Came down to the last minute, as usual. Had those five days off in a row, and didn't quite put to them as efficient use as I could have. But yeah, our move-out day was Saturday. Naturally, when I left for my 5-10 shift Saturday night, I wasn't done yet. Of course, to be fair, David wasn't either. He talked to the lady in the front office, and she said that as long as the keys were in the drop box when she checked it Sunday morning, it was fine. We were guessing around eight am, that was our goal. The plan was that I'd meet up with David at the apartment after work, we'd finish up.

Of course, it didn't happen.

I ended up having to close, which wouldn't have normally been a big deal, except I was already tired, and was planning on finishing up moving after work. David came by about twelve thirty, after calling me a record *three* times. So yeah, we talked about what we were going to do; he was going to finish most of the cleaning, get all of his stuff out, and leave his keys somewhere for me - either come back by the store and drop them off, or something. It got kind of busy at close - not terribly busy, but busy enough that I couldn't really do any preclosing. I helped the drivers get out of there, did money. I just had inventory left, but I just couldn't bring myself to get up and do it. Most frustrating. *Finally* got up and did it, got out of there at like five. Yeah, I know. Shut up. Came home to change and stuff. I actually dozed for like half an hour or so. However, I came to fairly soon, ran over to mom's, grabbed the vacuum cleaner, and got back to the Cedars. I was really, really tired and frustrated by that point, just wanted to be done with the whole damn thing.

Of course, at this point, I'd like to interject that yes, I know it was my fault that I was having to scramble at the last minute to get this stuff done, that I had more than enough time to have taken care of all this at a leisurely pace during my vacation, and that the fact that I squandered that time alloted to me was completely my fault, and that the negative experience I was going through at that point can be directly attributed to the aforementioned squandering. I know that, and do not shirk from responsibility for my actions, my decisions.

Moving on.

I got everything out, got the last cleaning up taken care of, got out of there. I locked the door for the last time at 7:52 (remember, our goal was 8 am), and dropped the key in the drop box at 7:59. Last minute? Oh yeah.

Drove back to Mom's to return the vacuum cleaner, she was actually up. I sat and talked with her for a little bit. It was embarrasing, but I actually broke down in tears in front of her - I was just so tired, frustrated, etc. She understood, though - "I guess I won't be seeing you this Sunday, huh?"

I love her.

So yeah, moved in at the new place. Kinda. The stuff from that last load is still out in the back of my truck. Well, most of it - I'm slowly moving it in, one piece at a time. The lamp came in; that's now in the living room. I donated the bust of Mozart to work, since I didn't want it anymore. It's sitting in the office right now. Most of my boxes aren't unpacked; I've been pulling out what I need, when I need it. I've got two and a half days off, though, starting Monday, and I hope to make some progress on those days. I'm fairly happy with my room - there's curtains in front of the window, so it stays fairly dark even in the middle of the day, which is nice. Overhead fan, also nice. There are a few things that are less than perfect, though. My desk is in my room, which is fine, but we ended up having to put it in the corner next to the bed, so my back is facing the door. I know it's silly, but I don't like having my back to the door. Also, Ambra's room is right next to mine, so I can't play music very loud when she's asleep (I learned that one the hard way). And, I keep hearing that out pool is absolutely terrible.

Overall, though, not too bad.

Let's see, what else...? Hmm. Oh yeah, work. Work's, well, interesting. I have one closing shift this week, which starts in about nine hours. I've been working late inside shifts, mainly with Gina closing, which hasn't been terribly fun. Tuesday night, I closed with Gina; I set the till and did a deposit before I left. She calls me after close, 'cause we were a hundred and fourteen dollars short. Her exact words: "Do you want to tell me where it is?" That's highly, highly offensive. Now, certainly, that amount of money short is something to be concerned about, I don't challenge that at all. But phrasing it like that sounds *very* much like an accusation. Unintentional, I hope, but still. It ended up being a mistake Jimmy made when he checked out a driver, coupled with Jenn entering in her deposit with two digits transposed.

We had an MIT rally on Thursday at Dave & Buster's in San Antonio. Total joke. I rode down with Joe; Sergio and Jenn also went from San Marcos. Jess sent Mel and Trevor. Good times. Let's see... we split up into four groups and did the 'Domino's Cheer', which I didn't participate in. Well, to observers, I did. We sat while Jenn talked to us about various topics - the OER form, the new MIT eval form, the hiring process, leading our shifts, etc. By "talked to us", I really mean "read powerpoint slides". Joe said on the way down there that he was going to walk out if that was the case, but he didn't. They served us some lunch, but I didn't eat any, since I had some Taco Cabana that morning. Stan said we could go play in the game room as long as we were back on time. Sergio and I both did - they had PIU 7th edition. I hate PIU - I have the hardest time telling the difference between jumps and runs, since there's no color differentiation to help you, only spacing, and I have a tendency to hold my head at odd angles which makes it hard to tell when things are aligned horizontally. But yeah, came back into the meeting room all sweaty, which was kinda funny. Walked up to the bar to get some water, and all the supervisors, Jenn, and Mike were all sitting there. Speaking of which, she (Eileen) started dancing a little during the break.

Horrifying.

We played Jeopardy at one point; I got one question right - name the five guiding principles, in order. There was also an auction. Top item was an Ipod Nano, which Jenn ended up winning; there were also five pairs of tickets to Fiesta Texas. Joe, Sergio, and I won one. Not a pair each, but one pair between the three of us. Still don't know how that one's going to work out. But yeah. Murph came up and talked a little bit at the end of the meeting. Nothing terribly impressive there.

Overall... blech.

We also had a mandatory meeting - I don't quite remember what day it was, though I'm pretty sure I closed that night - at like nine. We didn't know what it was about initially, though there was a rumor going on that they had found something objectionable on the cameras. That later turned out to be false. Everyone was there for once, which suprised me. Gina brought kolaches from Shipley's, and orange juice, so it wasn't a total loss. She addressed a few store-wide conerns while we waited on Eileen (who had called Gina to tell her to hold the meeting, and was leading it), who ran about five minutes late. She then dropped one word about what the meeting was going to be about - 'Myspace'.

I couldn't help but break out into laughter. Gina asked me to make sure I didn't do that in front of Eileen. I said I'd do what I could.

So Eileen got up and started talking. Overall, she was very vague, didn't really say anything specific. She talked about employees writing derogatory things about the company, their job, and customers on personal electronic things. She never said 'myspace' directly, but I'm fairly certain that's what she was talking about. She told Ambra that she had seen her myspaec profile (Not at the meeting. I'm just throwing things in randomly, 'cause I do that). She reminded us that that was strictly against company policy, made us re-sign the electronic use agreement form, and tried to feed us some TOTAL BULLSHIT about it being for our protection - that if some customer recognized themselves, they might get angry with a gun or sue us for slander or something. At this point, Emily raised her hand, and said something along the lines of "I really don't want to be a smartass, but it's only slander if it's spoken; it's libel if it's written, and it has to be untrue." Which is true - it has to be untrue, the person saying/writing it has to know it's untrue, and they have to have some sort of malicious intent. I didn't bother arguing that with Eileen, though. She also said at one point, "If you dislike your job that much, the door's right there."

As far as Joe and I can figure, someone at the office was browsing Myspace and came across an employee's page, which set off this whole thing. And, as usual, older people are rushing into things without trying to understand what they're dealing with. It's similiar to the MPAA and RIAA dealing with p2p networking and bittorrent - for the most part, they have no idea what they're dealing with, are trying normal tactics, and it isn't working.

IT'S CALLED VENTING, YOU IGNORANT JACKASSES!

I mean, I'll concede that an employee that isn't happy at their job isn't really a great employee. Well, it's not an optimal situation. But if that employee shows up every day, works diligently, and doesn't have any problems at work, does it matter if they go home and vent on their personal space? Okay, yeah, that can be a warning sign that they might quit one day or otherwise express their disgruntledness, but when you're dealing with every store in the company being understaffed, can you afford to wait and *only* have completely optimal situations?

So anyway.

Ambra finally stepped down as GM of Seguin. That's not too suprising. What's suprising is that it took her this long to do so. I was worried about her for a long time, when she'd break down in tears in frustration over the situation. She seems happier now though, which is important.

Well, she would, if the company would stop fucking her over. It's really, really frustrating to watch, since I can't really say anything about it. They won't let her work in Seguin anymore, since they don't like former GMs working in their old stores. In general, it's a fairly understandable rule - avoiding things like power struggles and awkwardness in general. Eileen herself proved the validity of this rule when she bitched to Gina about everything they had done to 'her' store after she left. So yeah, I can kind of understand the rule. But in this situation, I think an exception would be warranted. Jess (who took over Seguin, even though she just wants to come back to San Marcos) needs another driver, Ambra's willing to drive, knows the town well, and can swing to cover shifts, line, etc., when she's needed. She never really wanted Seguin in the first place, and was glad to no longer be there, so it's not like she'd be trying to hold on to the reigns of power or subconciously undermine Jess or anything. That, and she conferred with Jess a lot even when she was GM, so it's not like the employees would be confused with them both being in the store or anything.

To complicate matters, Eileen won't let Ambra come work in San Marcos, 'cause "we're dating" - which we're not. There's nothing between us, there never has been, and I highly doubt there ever will be. I mean, if I hadn't said anything *way* back when, this never would have come up in the first place. Admittedly, I feel kind of bad about it now. I mean, like half the company thinks we're dating, including most of the upper echelons of power. I'm sure us moving in together didn't do much to help quell those rumors. I personally don't care what people think about me, what they say about me, but it does bother me when that spills over to someone I care about. From our conversations, I gather that it doesn't really bother her either, but it still irks at me. I mean, if I wanted, I could go off the deep end and say that it's Chelsea all over again.

Luckily, I'm past that.

I hope.

Jojo -- Leave

I'm a freaky girl

So, here goes another attempt to make a massive posting, catching everything up. I'm still debating whether to try to tackle things categorically or chronologically. Each path has its own benefits and drawbacks. I find it easier to think categorically most of the time, so I'm going to start with that. We'll see how it goes from there.

Let's see... it's tough to figure out where to start, which is one of the areas that chronologically has a decided advantage. In fact, I think it has enough of one that I'm going to switch to chronologically, with the occasional switch to categorically when it's warranted.

Looking back... it's been a while. I've had little posts here and there, but they've been largely insubstantial. I'll start with the Monday Ambra and I planned on going out together. This was like, late April. It was something fairly 'normal' - out to dinner, and V for Vendetta, which she hadn't seen yet. It's my plan to make sure everyone cool has seen that movie. I came close, but failed on one count. Well, for now, but I'm sure I can remedy it, given time. So yeah, we took Sunday night paperwork like always, then she crashed over here, like always. We crashed, like always. It's when we woke up that things weren't like they always were.

We kissed.

Not really.

But it would have been weird if we did.

There was a fire.

I'm serious about that part.

We woke up to a really, really loud knocking on the door. I went and answered it, and there was no one there. The door across the way was open too, and the guy pokes his head out and says something to the effect of "The lady was going around, telling everyone there was a fire and they should get out." So Ambra and I got up and went and sat in the grass towards the complex. Sure enough, there was a fire. Fire trucks, firemen, the whole fire-people thing. It seemed very well contained to the apartment at the very end of our building, so we eventually just went back into the apartment and commenced chilling, as it seemed neither one of us was really going to be able to go back to sleep. Sergio called at one point, at Gina's behest, to make sure we were okay. I would later learn she had told one of the office staff that one or more of her managers was in there, and that they had to knock extra-loud, since I would sleep through just about anything. But yeah, Sergio talked in that way he does when something is being really weird - "Gina wanted me to call you and make sure you were okay, something about a fire." I assured him we were fine, and that was that. Ambra received a call not too long afterwards, from Jess. Turned out she wasn't feeling very well at all, and needed Ambra to come in for her. That kind of shot our plans down, since Ambra had to go in and all. I ended up going and picking up Amplitude (which is an AWESOME game), and a few books from Half Price Books.

The only bright spot was that Jess agreed to come in for Ambra on Wednesday, since she had come in for her on Monday. So yeah, we went and had our little date-thing. Her choice for dinner was Outback, which turned out really well. Awesome blossom appetizer, always good. We both enjoyed our meal. At one point, I made eye contact with one of the people at the table of six to our right. That person was Murph, our owner. I mean, the owner of all the San Antonio, San Marcos, and Seguin Domino's. He was with Eileen, Walter, Stan, Rex, and Mike. It was... kinda weird. They didn't come over and talk, we didn't go over and talk, nothing. They did, however, end up picking up our tab, which was *very* nice of him, and unexpected. Let's see... V for Vendetta after that, which was AWESOME. Nothing notable after that.

Then, it's kind of a blur. Not much more I can say on the Ambra front. We haven't hung out a whole lot lately; she's been having to work a lot, and our schedules haven't matched up nicely like they did for a while. I did talk to her about the whole "I had been thinking about it, I just didn't want to say anything 'cause I didn't want to be tease' thing that she had said one Sunday evening. It may have even been that Sunday, right after we ate out. Not sure. But yeah, that's what she said, which was interesting. I mean, the chances of us hooking up are, well, fairly small. In a lot of ways, I think we'd be a good couple, but there are enough points of contention that it'd be interesting to see if things work out. I mean, hell, I'm in the middle of moving in with her, which is pretty cool. So yeah.

So, we'll come back to Ambra in a little bit. On to Lilie. Good stuff. So, quick recap - found out she was dating [], I kind of mis-reacted.

Freaky Girl -- Thomilla

Is that you doing that to me?

Argh. It's finally done. Well, yeah. At least my part is. It took a while, but in the end, it was worth it. Hopefully, they're happy in their new place. It's hard to tell from the second day, but things are going okay so far. Been running around like crazy since Thursday, but yeah, things are finally calm again. 6-12 tonight, 5-C tomorrow, training class 10-4 Wednesday... but after that, nothing Wednesday evening. Close Thursday, late Friday, then off Saturday and Sunday. Well, theoritically. Emily's insider-ing Saturday, but has a baby shower to go to, and it doesn't look like there'll be anyone else to pick up her shift, so I might end up doing it. I don't particularly want to - I'm really looking foward to the prospect of two consecutive days off, especially on a weekend. That'd rock. Don't really have anything planned just yet, though I could head up to Austin and play some DDR, maybe hang out with Rose and Lilie.

Speaking of which... nah, I'll get to that in my mega-post coming later.

But yeah, I have a few things that I need to attend to. I really need to stop dangling participles, apparently. But seriously... first and foremost, I need a really good night's sleep, both in quality and quantity. I've had one or the other, but not both lately. It's been primarily a lack of both, though last night (this morning), it was terrific quality, almost no quantity. But I can take care of that tonight and tomorrow night. But I really need to clean off my desk, and clean my room a little, and I think I might need to do some laundry.

Oh, put things in motion to become Ambra's roommate, more on that later. Like, official things and all that.

But yeah, more substantial post coming later. I hope.

Jakalope -- Feel It

Having the time of your life

Hmm... yeah, Saturday was fun.

The crew meeting was fun, the bowling party was a blast. Oh, and V for Vendetta is FUCKING AWESOME. I say that even though I fell asleep during parts of it - not continuous sleep, just dozing off here and there, my head lolling back... kind of embarrasing, since I was on a first date and everything. She didn't say anything about it, I don't know if she noticed. I hope not. But yeah, the movie was still awesome, and it sounds like I'm going to see it (at least) two more times - Rose on Friday, and Ambra on Monday.

So, the date... it went well, I think. Well, as well as could have been expected. She admitted that it was kind of awkward, her being friends with Janelle and everything, which is understandable. I told her it was cool if she wanted to call the whole thing off, but she didn't. I got my truck vacuumed and everything, I think it looks pretty nice. Of course, it was a moot point - I got hung up at Mom's house as her and Mike were asking about Ashley, and since Janelle happened to be there, she pulled up her facebook, which was FUN. So yeah, by the time I got back here and showered, then left to pick her up... she called me as I got about a block away, asked me if I wanted her to just meet me here, so I didn't miss the beginning, which is what we eventually did. I ended up standing outside the theather for a bit, waiting on her, which I really, really hate doing - I mean, I'm not complaining since it was definitely my fault and everthing, I'm just saying, I feel like such a doof when I have to do that. But she showed up before too long, and we went and got our seats. Ended up sitting down *just* as the previews were ending, which is good and bad, but still good timing.

Then, the movie.

Afterwards, we ended up standing outside by her car for like an hour and a half, just talking about myriad varied topics. Fairly enjoyable, no long awkward pauses or anything. I would later learn that Gina drove by at one point, as her little cabal was going to a late show, but they didn't say anything, figuring that the last thing you need when you're out on a first date is for your manager to show up and be like, "Hey! What's up?" - which isn't really true. I mean, yeah, if Dave did that, I wouldn't be happy, but Gina's cool. So yeah, we stood around and talked, and she finally had to leave, competition in the morning and everything. I walked across the parking lot to my truck, very nearly broke out in tears. I really, really don't know why - I certainly wasn't disappointed with how the date went or anything; hell, at that point, I was still surprised it had happened at all. I mean, even now, I still don't know what set me off. But yeah... I had been thinking about going up to Austin to play DDR, but I ended up just falling right asleep, since I had been up for quite a while at that point, and running around crazy for a good portion of it.

Woke up, went in to work Sunday 5 - C. Gina told me she saw me on my date, asked about Ambra and me, apparently like half the upper management things we're dating. I mean, it's an easy mistake to make, given how much time we spend together and what-not. I did Sunday night paperwork as usual, Ambra brought some XL dough on her way in... and I managed to lock myself out of the store while I was looking at the dough. Good stuff. I got Joe's roommate to bring me up the store key - Joe was kind of drunk - and finished up everything. Ambra and I talked a little about the misconceptions going on about us. She said something to the effect of "I've been thinking about [us dating], but didn't want to say anything about it, 'cause I didn't want to be a tease." which can be read one of two ways, but more on that later. Took the paperwork, came back here and crashed. We were thinking about going to see V for Vendetta at 3, but when my alarm went off at 1, she was in no mood to get up, so I got up and doinked around for a few hours while she slept. Didn't do much with my day off Monday, worked Tuesday 5 - C. Really, really slow for a Tuesday night - I think our highest pie hour was like a 48, which is *really* slow for Tuesday night. Found out Jimmy's not going to be a manager, "just" an insider (well, a San Marcos insider, at least), which makes me happy, 'cause I don't like him.

I mean, just as a person. I'm sure he's a fine worker, there hasn't been anything to make me dislike him, that's just my snap judgments kicking in. I'm not engraving that in stone, he still has an oppurtunity to show me I shouldn't dislike him, but 'til then...

Today (Wednesday)'s been okay. Had to go to training class with Joe 7 - 10. I really hate being in a San Antonio-based franchise, when we have to drive like 30-45 minutes to get to these things, very annoying. The class itself was pretty bad - the title was "Fundamentals." The only thing I learned was that someone has trademarked the phrase "Emotional Bank Account", which I still can't really wrap my head around. There were comment sheets to fill out, and that's really all I talked about. The rest of the stuff was stuff they had already shoved down my throat by the end of the first week, so yeah, pretty boring. I crashed on the way back, which is why I'm still up, and probably won't go to sleep. I just finished filing my taxes, netted a fairly sweet 1600+ return. Unfortunately, most of that - about 1300 - will go to finishing paying of my transmission loan, but that's still about 350 or so to play around with. Probably just go into my account, nothing really excited looming or anything. Well, except for moving in with Ambra in a little over a month.

So, what else is new? Let's see...

Rose and Lilie are moving to Austin, sounds like they're going to be moving into the Hills of Chevy Chase, which is an awesome name for an apartment complex. They'll be up on Wickersham-ish, so I can definitely stop by to say hi when I'm up there to play DDR or whatever. I'm taking Rose to go see V for Vendetta on Friday, which will be fun - again, it's a fantastic movie. She's still with Richard, which is great, but I don't know what's going to happen when they move to Austin, except I think she's buying his old car. Or something. Lilie kind of half-way admitted she had kind of led me on, which is nice, I s'pose, 'cept I don't really care. I mean, I'll always be in love with her, I just don't love her. I still get a little melancholy about her every once in a while, but that's very few and far between, so that's nice. I doubt I'll ever get over her fully - why should she be the first? - but it's progress. Hell, one day, I might even be able to talk to her again.

But anyway.

Played DDR on campus today, which was fun. I've fallen far - I couldn't even pass Healing Vision (Angelic Mix) on Heavy, but I know I can get back up there. Cullen and I are (pgoing up to Austin on Friday to play, which will be fun. We haven't really hung out in like nine months or so, so that'll be cool.

Ambra's being weird, as usual. She's just hard to read, I guess. Hell, most girls are, I'm just dealing with this one up close and personal, so the difficulties are magnified. But that's another story for another time.

Shana Vanguarde -- Dancing Queen

I'm walking from the wreckage

So I knew going into that today was shaping up to be a busy, hectic, but fun-filled day, and so far, I've been right. Had the store meeting at nine, that went alright. As usual, the people that needed to hear what was being said the most weren't there. It's nice to know that some things are the same, no matter where you're at. Ashley, Joe, and I all stayed to help put the truck up, left around eleven or so. Ambra ended up coming over last night, she's still crashed out on my bed. I just finished washing my truck - first time in 3 ¹/₂ years that I've done so - the last time was on my birthday, when we went and played Lazer Tag, and Zara was joining us. I also ended up driving to Austin and back four times that night - good stuff. I also just got my first mail at PlentyofFish.com, a free dating site I put my profile on a month or so ago for the heck of it - she was commenting on my wings. So now, I still need to go figure out what I'm going to get Mom for her birthday - I'm thinking some mulch and a good book - and vacuum out my truck, to really complete it. I need to be at the bowling alley by 1:30, so I'm doing fine on time, but I need to squeeze a shower in there too somewhere, which is going to be interesting. After that, I'm probably going to come home and shower *again*, then take Ashley Hughes (who, as it turns out, not only knows Janelle, but has several clases with her) out for dinner and a movie. That's going to be interesting, if she doesn't cancel - it is kind of weird, after all, her knowing Janelle and going out on a date with her big brother and all. After that... well, after that, I'm strongly considering heading up to Austin to play some DDR, hopefully at Blazer Tag, and definitely at Einstein's. I even sent an email over to Cullen, try to re-establish contact with him, see if he's interested in going with me, which would be frickin' awesome. So yeah, that's where I'm at now... and it's almost 12:30, which means I need to move my little heiny out the door if I'm going to get all the stuff done that I need to within the time frame I have.

The goose is, in fact, loose, ladies and gentlemen.

Route-1 Ft Jenny Frost -- Crash Landing

It was one by one, baby, two by two

So, the internet is acting all crappy. More specifically, our connection. It's not totally crapped out, just mostly. Sporadic, even. IM'ing isn't really affected, browsing is tedious and frustrating, but tolerable. Gaming? Not gonna happen. Even with this, though, I have to say I very much prefer Time Warner over Grande. We'll test how much of the terrible service from Grande was due to our location after I move in with Ambra - she has Grande high-speed as part of their rent, so yeah. So no WoW or anything right now, but it does give me a good chance to deal with some backlogged posting I'd been planning on.

So, I'm going to tackle my to-do list, see how far I get on that.

Let's do dreams first. I've two recently. The first one involved Carrie and a space shuttle. We were on the space shuttle, a group of like maybe twelve-fifteen of us, sitting around this big table. There was a problem, and apparently, none of us could move. Something to do with not being able to take our shoes off the floor, and not having any way to remove our shoes. I wasn't affected by it, since I wasn't wearing any shoes. There really isn't anything more to that part than just that image, that explanation. The second part of the dream, I'm with Carrie. I think we were still in the space shuttle, or a train. Some sort of enclosed compartment with a window. I go to hold her hand, and she says that it's okay, but that her boyfriend might not approve, and I was just heartbroken. Very weird.

The second dream starts out with Roland and I walking down the halls of our high school. Now, something I didn't really notice when I was there, mainly because I was in all AP level courses which were predominantly white, but our high school has a strong hispanic majority. Not too startling in hindsight. So Roland and I are walking down the hallway, and there's a *ton* of hispanic guys as well - almost to the point of congestion. He starts getting elbowed a little, bodily pushed, and eventually ends up getting pushed out this door. He was killed, though there was nothing to support it; I knew it, the way you randomly know things in dreams. So a little later, they come to take me out; there's a group of them about to attack me in the middle of a hallway; everyone else is in class. I basically beat the crap out of them, I distinctly remember throwing one guy into the wall. It was pretty cool. One of them eventually pulled out a baseball bat, but he didn't use it until some sort of authority figure was confronting me about the incident. He swung it at me, but I caught it, which was pretty cool, then I went on a rampage with it. Later, they came after me at my house; I was hiding under a blanket or something. They poked me with a baseball bat, and chaos ensued again. The final part had me facing the mafia leader in my house, but he was caught with police on the way, and trying desperately to get me to free him, which I wasn't going to do. He lights a lighter and drops it, indicating that he's going to burn the house down if we don't free him. We don't, and just walk away. I'm trying to remember where Lilie made a cameo in the dream - I wrote that she did when I was making my post list, but I don't rememeber anymore. Ah, well...

Most of the rest of the stuff I plan to post has to do with work - even hanging out with Ashley, moving in with Ambra, it all ties in to work in one way or another. Except... WoW. Blech, but out of a mindless sense of duty, might as well.

So, 1.10 finally hit. I respecc'ed Ihatebrooms to Disc/Holy, as I planned to, got her to 50. Haven't been playing very much lately, just haven't been in the mood. I've considered cancelling once or twice, but I don't think I will, not just yet. That'll probably take a day off or two where I have absolutely no inclination whatsoever to play. We'll see. Only done the first step of the Dungeon 2 set with Gnometastic, probably working on the next step.

So yeah, on to work.

Let's start with all the new hiring going on. We have a *ton* of new people right now - a *ton*. It's frustrating, but there are a few nice aspects to it. Some of the new people are panning out nicely, but they're not quite enough just yet to replace everyone we've lost. I mean, in the driver section, the *only* people we've retained are Mal, Travis, Ray, and Ross. We haven't lost any of the managers, though, which has really helped pull us through the worst bits. I'm hesitant to start naming names and really going in depth on who I don't like and why, but there are a few. I won't shed any tears over the two we just lost, though - they were the top two on my list of people I really, really didn't like to work with. I'm still toying with the idea of leaving and going to work at the Wal-Mart or HEB Distribution warehouse. Interesting random fact - I *hate* working in food, and I *hate* being a manager. At least, I hate the part of being a manager that involves dealing with whining. I HATE whining. I should probably clarify that. I don't hate *all* whining - I think some whining is constructive, even necessary. People have a need to vent, to blow off steam about things, and that's close to whining, but perfectly fine. People are going to complain about things that happened, they're going to talk to their friends about it, sure, yeah. I'm talking about whining about doing your DAMN job, ESPECIALLY if you get paid more than me.

But anyway...

So yeah, people are really immature when they call after close and get all upset. I mean, I can understand not being sure of our hours, or the whole open later on Friday and Saturday thing, and I don't mind answering a question or three. But seriously, GROW THE FUCK UP people. I mean, I'll hear people in the background going "Man, fuck Domino's! I'm never buying stuff from there again!" , or asking if I can just make *them* an exception and send them out a pizza, or - my personal favorite - getting upset that I had the nerve to answer the phone, even though we're not open. That one *really* pisses me off, and as such, I've created a list of reasons why we do it.

1. First and foremost, it's company policy. They tell us to do it, we do it.
   
2. That phone is really annoying, especially since I've been listening to it ring for the past eight to ten hours. If I don't pick it up, I'm going to have to listen to it ring until you hang up.
   
3. Along those lines, if I don't pick it up, you're going to be sitting there, listening to the automated message saying "Your call is being transferred to a team member", wondering if we're open and just taking a while to answer the phone, closed, or what, until you decide to hang up. It's a courtesy to you, bitches.
   
4. It's entirely likely it could be one of the other stores in our franchise calling with a question about paperwork, procedure, or inventory.
   
5. Most of our employees know the best time to call with a question about their schedule is after close, when, while we're still busy, we're able to pause for a minute or three and let them know when they come in the next day or whatever.
   
6. Along the same line, family members and significant others often call after close, since it's the best time to catch someone who's closing, for the same reasons noted above.

Not a terribly long list, but one that I feel presents sufficient explanation for answering the phone after close.

So yeah, Ambra. She's doing okay. Well, better than she was. She just wants out. And I don't blame her - none of us wanted the job, certainly, which is why she got stuck with it. Things are still on track for me to move in with her after Jessie moves out, and I'm still looking foward to it. We've been hanging out a lot lately - Eileen and Gina have banned her from coming to the store to hang out after close, which is weird - but she's been over here a lot, I'm taking her to Mom's birthday party tomorrow. In fact, she's sleeping in my bed right now... good times. Definitely nothing there, though, which is what she said she wanted, so that's all good. I still like her, probably more after hanging out with her so much, which makes me more confident that it's for the right reasons, which I was worried about. Or maybe I'm just being stubborn... I don't know.

So it's been a real blast working with Ashley (Emily too, but she hasn't introduced me to any cute friends, which is why I bring up Ashley, but not Emily) - great personality, driven, quick learner, etc. That, and she has three really cute friends - Aliare, Beth, and Ashley. Way back when, she was talking about trying to hook me up with Aliare, since she thought our personalities would go well together, but I kind of negated that one, since Alaira does pot, smokes, and drinks, which are my three main things I look for to not exist in a girl. The second and third are negotiable to some degree, but the first is definitely not. In fact, I even asked Ashley out - I'm picking her up later today, I think we're doing dinner and a movie? Nothing terribly creative, but hey, it's the first date. Of course, that's your only chance to make a good first impression, but I've always really sucked at first impressions. It's going to be a fun day, regardless, with Mom's birthday party, a date with Ashley, and then, most likely, heading up to Austin for some DDR. That'll be fun, yeah...

Rihanna -- Pon De Replay

Was lost in the moment, got carried away

So yeah, 12 closing shifts in a row, all of them 5-C, with the exception of that one shift in Seguin where I didn't show up 'til around 6-7. Good stuff, lemme tell you. I mean, yeah, I'm certainly going to enjoy the paychecks that this will bring - these two weeks were 60 and 56-ish hours, and I've got another 50-something hours this week. It really drives home, however, my total lack of a life outside of work, though, and I'm not sure how I feel about it.

But then I load up WoW and forget about it for a while.

So, how has work been going? Pretty good. Susannah quit, Thompson put in his two weeks notice, and Oscar is apparently a disbarred lawyer... the new people are doing great, and they'll fit right in, though Enrique and I are having conflicts from time to time. Ashley decided to try to hook me up with one of her friends, Aliare, though I don't know if I'm going to let her - I don't know if things would work out, and it might be kind of weird.

So, what is there outside of work? Well, more work, really. Ambra has Seguin now, and, well, I *think* things are getting better. It's not like when she first took it over, and would come by our store every evening in tears, but that still happens occasionally. I've worked three shifts there so far, and she definitely has some decent people, just not enough. I wouldn't say I'm looking foward to working there, but I am looking foward to helping her out, working next to her from time to time, that kind of thing.

Oh, and moving in with her.

Went out with Rose and Kelly (Rose's friend from South Carolina by way of Orlando) last night. I dropped them off at Flipnotics and went to Einstein's to play DDR. Yes, really. Eight months since the last time I played... and things went better than I thought, all things considered. I mean, I'm not in great shape. I'm in awful shape, and DDR was the only thing allowing me to retain what little fitness/stamina I had (with the exception of my calf muscles, which are as scary as they've ever been). So yeah, it was a little scary the first time. The result? I still have most of my speed, and a small fraction of my stamina. I couldn't do Drop Out on Doubles/Heavy, but I got almost everything up until the eighth note run at the end.

Rose kind of dyed my hair with some leftover hair dye... well, sorta. We were gonna do three stripes, but they all kind of rinsed out. You can *barely* see it, and pretty much, only if you're already looking for them. And let's see... oh yeah, while I was over there to pick up Rose, I ran into Lilie. Fun stuff. She walked in, saw me, and that was about the extent of our conversation.

Let's see, anything else? Hmm.. I'm off today, and Ambra's opening, so we're both going to be awake and not at work at the same time, which is something of a miracle, so we're going to go see a movie and hang out here or something. I still need to take some trash out, do some dishes before that, but I have like five hours.

Jaimeson -- Complete

No one in the club I'd rather see

So, just had lunch with the family + David and Ambra. Yeah, took Ambra. She told me later how cool my family is (Damn straight!) and they seemed to really enjoy her company as well, so that's good. Going back up 'bout 2 to teach her how to do Sunday night paperwork; that'll be fun. The last two nights have been kind of interesting as well. Joe and I got our asses kicked Friday night, just a lot of orders, and neither one of us was really up for it. Saturday night was much better - him, Ashley and I had a 106 pie hour, and we did fine. Let's see, last night, we had about an hour delivery time for the last part; Mike got back from his last run at about quarter to three; Josh didn't get back until about 3. We didn't finish up 'til about 4:30 - 5. I wasn't quite done yet, but Mike needed a ride back to his truck, and I was happy to oblige. We got him there, then drove back (so he could get his other truck, which was still at the store), and my key wouldn't work in the mag-lock. This lead to a chain of events that included having my key break off in the lock, spraying WD-40 in the lock, and calling Joe to see if his worked. It didn't. So we left a message with Gina letting her know what happened. Went up there this morning after waking up; her key didn't work either, but Eileen's master key did. She's going to get the locksmith out there tomorrow to fix everything up. Good stuff. I have to go back up there in about eight hours or so to train Ambra on Sunday night paperwork; otherwise, I have the day off. Have 5-C the next five days, then Saturday and Sunday off, which is kind of nice, though the fact that it's Saturday and Sunday doesn't have any special significance for me, as opposed to say, Wednesday and Thursday. Ambra's closing Saturday and Sunday, so that's kind of funny. Still not sure what's going on there. Nothing, really.

So anyway.

Akon -- Lonely

But there's nothing I can say

Not dead yet. No, not by a long shot. I certainly understand the confusion, however. Hell, I even had to check myself, just to be sure. Just had a really hectic week at work, had 55 hours with five closing shifts, kind of caught me off-guard. I've actually got a day off today (Tuesday), but the scant free time alloted to me is rapidly being claimed by myriad activities. I need to go by the bank and deposit my paycheck, and well, that's about it so far. Kinda. I think Joe and I are going to hook up after he's done with lessons and watch Anchorman - he's never seen it.

Frightening.

There's a chance Ambra'll be joining us for that, which would be cool. Oh, and we might go bowling afterwards, which would also be cool. I want to get the dishes caught up again, and I need to get all my trash out to the dumpster. Wouldn't mind playing some WoW in there, but it's not a huge priority or anything.

So, just throwing a few pebbles in the pond to make some ripples, 'cause the water's been way too calm for too long now. So more later.

Milky -- Be My World

I don't know where you're going, and I don't know why

I'm still here. I don't think I've posted at all this year. Wait, I did once, but that was just the 1.9 patch notes, and that was only so that I wouldn't have to go hunt them down every time I had a question about them. But I'm still here, and I plan on resuming posting here shortly - I have today and tomorrow off (And yesterday, though I don't think it counts anymore, since I ended up going in for about an hour to cover for Joe, who was coming in from Dripping Springs and was going to be a bit late.) There are a few posts I still plan on making - one final post about Lilie, to wrap everything up, which I STILL haven't done, though I could have done it any time in the last few months, and it wouldn't have been that different. Well, it would have. My thoughts on the matter change frequently, but they're settling down. Still want to catch up on what's going on with work and/or life - they're more or less one and the same right now. Cleaning my room right now; it's the first time I've cleaned it - really cleaned it - since I moved here. Well, the second. The first was a turbo run the last time Lilie came over, left, and said she might be coming back later. Yeah.

In other news, I got my picture storage blog whitelisted, so I can resume posting pictures there linking them here, which is nice.

Oh, and I figure I'll probably post something about how I blew it completely with Ambra.

Well, that's not really fair. There really wasn't anything there to screw up in the first place, just me doing weird, random things.

Which is nothing new.

Dht -- Listen to Your Heart

Never ever have I ever felt so low

So Jess asked me today how things are going with Ambra, and Felicia and I touched on that topic when she called about getting some stuff for the Steak Fanatic pizza, since she was about to run out and the office decided at the last minute to prolong the period of time in which we're offering the disgusting abomination. Yeah.

In both cases, I didn't really have an answer. Well, I did, kinda. The answer I had was that there wasn't anything to be going. I think that's my fault, as I haven't really pursued anything yet, mainly due to our schedules. Well, that, and I don't think I'm in an emotional state to even consider seeing someone else, when I can't seem to get past the last person I saw. I don't think it would be fair, the whole thing just sort of screams 'rebound' to me. So every time the oppurtunity arises, I passively let it go. Which got me to thinking about whether or not I should even try. I mean, first off, I'm not over Lilie, not by a long shot. Her stopping by work today and talking was enough to send me to the walk-in, crying, after she left, which was fun. Yeah. But something occurred to me about my relationship history the other day. Generally speaking, if the past is any indicator, this (Ambra) would end up being a disaster, or not ending well, or something like that, for the simple reason that someone else didn't do the hard part already.

That sounds a little weird, so I'm going to go dredging about in my past, a favorite pasttime of mine, and categorize my relationships by some new standards and see what patterns emerge. It should be fun.

Chelsea

Ah, yes, the one that started it all. Now, to be fair, you can't really even call this one a relationship. I mean, holy crap, we were kids. To be fair, yeah, a lot of kids are pursuing relationships - or some twisted version of it - this young, but I sure as hell didn't know what was going on.

• Initiation: Completely by myself. No help, nothing from her.
  
• Duration: A year, from the beginning to the end, but there's a lot of holes in the middle.
  
• Quality: Terrible. As I said, I had no frickin' clue what the hell was going on. My connection to reality has always been tenuous at best, and it was particularly weak concerning the fairer sex when I was younger (not to imply, by contrast, that it's any better now.)
  
• How: She finally realized that the entire thing was a terrible idea, had nothing to do with reality, and ended it. I appluad her for the action.
  
• Now: We never really talked before hand - I was too nervous - and not much after - I was too embarrassed. So, yeah.
  

Overall, a complete disaster. And it was all me. Isolated incident, or ignored foretelling? We'll see.

Shayna

I moped around a lot after Chelsea dumped me; one day, in Gamez's Algebra I class, Shayna raised her hand and asked, "Can I go over to Billy's desk and talk to him to make sure he's okay?" And gosh darn it, she did.

• Initiation: It was kind of a natural progression from the concern she showed for me, and the whole thing kind of grew out of that. I can't remember who asked who out, but the whole thing started from her.
  
• Duration: A couple months? I remember telling her I had a crush on Barbara in Ms. Baker's science class, which was still eighth grade, so I'm going to go with about three months, give or take.
  
• Quality: Pretty good, all things considered. Looking back, I'd say we clicked on certain things, and didn't really on other things, but more so positive than negative.
  
• How: She started things off when she came over and checked on me, and moved the whole thing along, until I torpedoed it all to hell. I'm pretty good at that. Told her I had written Barbara a secret-admirer letter, and that was pretty much that.
  
• Now: Friendly all the way through high school, but I haven't talked to her since. We're friends on MySpace, but haven't actually had any communication since. Good stuff.
  

She started things off, and they went well, until I ended them in my own special way. Inconclusive so far.

Barbara

So I developed a crush on Barbara, and pursued it. We went out for a while. I want to say sometime in April until band camp in the summer of our freshman year. Yeah, that sounds about right - her birthday was in late April, and I went to that as her boyfriend (or whatever), and I remember Josh giving me her break-up note after practice one day in summer band.

• Initiation: I asked her out after telling her I liked her. Nothing from anybody else.
  
• Duration: A few months. Five?
  
• Quality: Meh. We wrote letters back and forth almost every day, and went on a few outings - mainly movies, that I can remember. The Saint, Empire Strikes Back (I think), and Volcano spring to mind.
  
• How: We wrote letters back and forth all the time, so she broke up with me via letter - gave it to Josh to give to me after he was sure she'd left. In it, she said that I was "Immature" and two other things I don't really remember. She later (several years later) told me that she actually felt smothered. Fair enough.
  
• Now: We eventually started talking again later in high school after she spent most of freshmen year ignoring me (actively), except when her and Terri needed help in Biology, since Dufas was really, really bizarre and I was one of the few people who was able to figure out just what the hell he was trying to teach us on any given day. Spent some time with her via David a year or more ago, but nothing recent.
  

So this one is kinda like Chelsea - I started the whole thing, no third party help and nothing from her, and it was... well, lukewarm, for lack of a better word, and it ended with almost no warning.

Mary

Not going to go through the whole thing with Mary, since it lasted... three weeks, if that? I'll just mention that she asked me out within two weeks of school starting, we went on one date, and then she broke up with me. Fun stuff.

Crystal

Almost the exact same pattern as above. Hmm...

Kenni

Ah, Kenni. These were the good old days. Now that I think about it, I'm probably going to drop the structed list format and just kind of ramble. I met her at a pool party when Kristina asked if she could bring her little sister, which she did. Didn't think much of it at the time, 'til school started. Kenni was a freshman; I was a junior. Every morning, she'd come find me and give me a big hug and wish me a good day. Didn't matter where I was - in the cafetaria, chess club, or doing random tutoring in an equally random classroom - every morning, a good-morning hug. I eventually realized that that might be a sign, talked to Kristina about it briefly, asked her mom for permission, then went for it. Great relatiionship - we hung out a lot, enjoyed each other's company, gave each other our first kiss after the Homecoming Dance... good memories. It ended rather abruptly, because of a third party, it had nothing to do with either of us. So yeah, fairly successful, overall, and she started it.

Mindy

I'll try to keep this one brief. Crystal introduced us, since she thought we'd be good for each other, and Mindy wanted an older boyfriend. We hit it off very well right from the start, and had a long (at least by my standards - a year and a half) rollar-coaster relationship. We broke up and got back together eight times, and were a *bunch* of firsts for each other. Finally ended when I started going to UT. Fairly successful overall, and Crystal started it for us.

Suzie

She im'ed me one evening about what a jackalope was, and when we finally started hanging out, she dropped a ton of hints - we were sitting in her bed, and she had me start brushing her hair, a few others, until she finally takes me to this empty beach at like three am, and we had a moonlight stroll with the tide gently lapping at our ankles. I kissed her, she kissed me back, and we launched a four month relationship that lasted until I broke up with her on February 1st.

Lilie

Credit for this one goes to Kristen and Allison, who seriously tried to hook us up, and talked too much about it, respectively. The thought crossed my mind a few times during the relationship if it would have happened without their actions. Meh. Another fairly successful relationship brought about by other people's actions.

Sara

We only went on one date, but this was one that I pursued unilaterally, without second or third party assistance. Bombed when she found out I was an atheist, and told me she wouldn't be comfortable dating someone outside her religion.

Terri

Sort of skipped her, but I threw out any pretense of order a while back, and I'm approaching stream-of-consciousness writing here. We have a longer history than Mindy and I, and most likely just as tangled. It's really hard to say anything about this one in this context, though I remember one evneing at the Alkek library when she was definitely pushing hard to the hoop.

I guess the idea I'm trying to explore is that by far, my successful relationships have been those that were initiated by or came to fruitation through the acions of someone else, even the girl in question - Lilie, Mindy, Kenni, Suzie; whereas those that I initiated completely on my own - Barbara, Heather, Sara - tended to be lukewarm, go nowhere, and end relatively quickly or never even start. Now, it's not a definite rule - look at Crystal and Mary for very good counter-examples. However, as a general hypothesis, it does seem to fit most of the current evidence fairly well. Now, as to why, I have no idea. Granted, there's probably more of a confidence boost when there's definite signals coming in, and the fear of rejection is much, much less. That, and there's several layers of filtering already done, so any early flags that might have been thrown have already been cleared. However, I've never liked depending on other people to carry important messages for me - I'd rather do it myself.

I came to this realization almost a month ago during some reminiscing. I think it scares me, because as I grow more and more socially isolated, the chances of having that third party assistance - which, for the record, I've never solicited - declines rather steadily, not to say anything of the likelihood of second party signals.

I don't think much of this post makes sense, but I'm going to go with it anyway.


All Saints -- Never Ever

Hear that voice, it's the calm of your heart

This post is going to be sporadic and jumpy. Deal with it.

So I finally got to see my store. It's very much still under construction. When I was there, they were putting in the lights in the cieling, working on the walkin, all kinds of stuff. There were maybe 20 or so people working. I ended up just cleaning up the makeline (It's just like the one at Diana's store, blegh!!) and the oven (which is at a 45-ish degree angle to the cut table - double blegh!!). Eileen rode around in my truck a little, which was, well, fun. Not really. I ended up not being able to go to the work party, which Murph was quite adamant that I had to go to.

Oh yeah, Chelsea's in the shop right now. Transmission problems, which should be fun. So I'll be taking Mom's car to San Antonio tomorrow, which I'm not sure about. I guess I'll just show up about 9 or so, see what's going on.

So yeah, things are getting off to a great start.

Tried to download and run the D&D: Stormreach Online beta stress test, got a horrendous framerate - downright unplayable. Didn't help that David's ran flawlessly. So I can't really comment on the game just yet. Got my video card and processor overclocked now, though I'm waiting on an update of the Rage 3D utility for the 5.12 catalyst drivers. It's kind of annoying - I can pull 60+ fps in WoW, even with Windows Media Player playing a full length movie in the background. Update: Just hit 99 fps. Yeah.

So anyway. Talked to Ambra a little today. Kinda. I don't really remember what was said - I was half asleep the whole time. So for all those people asking me what's going on with that, yeah, I don't know. Probably nothing. Which accurately describes both my current social life and any prospects.

So I'm in kind of a holding pattern right now. I can't really start looking for a place in San Antonio until I find a new roommate for David. I really don't want to, I'll admit - we seem to get along so very well. It'll be a shame to lose that. But, ah, well. And I probably won't be able to find anyone until the students start coming back in January. That, and he's going to be gone for a few weeks, which makes things hard. Then I have to find a roommate and/or a place in San Antonio, preferably near the store. Once I take that step, it gets a lot harder to undo things. It'd still be really cool if Carrie moved down here and we got a place. Kind of random, but really cool.

So, yeah. Blegh. Can I get a reset button? That'd be nice.

No idea -- I wish I knew